South Carolina House Minority Leader State Representative J. Todd Rutherford (D) said that a protester who took down the Confederate flag at the South Carolina statehouse “became a hero to many people because so many of us wanted to go up and take that flag down” on Thursday’s “All In with Chris Hayes” on MSNBC.
Rutherford was asked if the move would “make people say these activists are being impatient and we have a process,’ or does it galvanize people?”
He answered, “I think people would always try and blame somebody for their vote if they didn’t vote to take it down. But, the reality is, those people that don’t want to vote for take it down are looking for any reason to blame, rather than the truth, which is this is a flag of hatred, it’s a flag bigotry, and it needs to come down. Bree [Newsome, the woman who climbed the flagpole and took down the flag] became a hero to many people because so many of us wanted to go up and take that flag down. We’re so tired of pretending like we’re not bothered by it when we really are. We’re so tired of pretending like it doesn’t represent exactly what it does, which is a history of racism and a history of slavery.”
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